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CONTENTS
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TESTIMONY OF
PAGE
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Thomas A,
, Parrott
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EXHIBITS
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EXHIBIT
NUMBER
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No. I
Parrott
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No. 2
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No. 4
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No. 5
Parrott
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No. 6
Parrott
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No. 7
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Parrott
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No. 9
Parrott
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UNCLASSIFIED
COMMITTEE BUSINESS
Thursday, July 10, 1975
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United States Senate,
Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with Respect to
Intelligence Activities,
Washington, D. C.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 o 1 clock
a. itu, in Room S-128, The Capitol, Senator Frank Church
(Chairman) presiding.
Present: Senators Church (presiding) , Hart of Michigan, w
Mondale, Baker, and Tower,
Also present: William Miller, Staff Director? Frederick A
Schwarz, J^ • , Chief Counsel; and Curtis R. Smothers, Minority
Counsel, Charles Kirbow, Frederick Baron, John Bayly, Charles *
Lombard, and Michael J, Madigan, and- David Aaron, Professional
Staff Members, • *
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UNCLASSIFIED
PROCEEDINGS
The Chairman. The hearing will come to order.
Mr. Parrott, would you please stand and take the oath?
Do you swear that all of the testimony that you give
in this proceeding will be the truth, the whole truth, and
nothing but the ^ruth, so help you God?
Mr. Parrott. I do.
The Chairman. Mr. Schwarz, will you start the questioning?
Mr. Schwarz, Mr. Parrott, as I told you, first I want
to go through the procedural matters .
You are aware that you have the right to counsel?
Mr. Parrott. Yes. #
Mr. Schwarz, And if at any time you want to stop to obtain
counsel you have that right.
Mr. Parrott. Yes,
Mr. Schwarz. And you have your Constitutional rights.
You are aware of that.
Mr. Parrott. I am.
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2 Mr. Schwarz. Would you state your name and address for
the record, please?
Mr. Parrott. Thomas A. Parrott,
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Mr. Schwarz. Now Mr. Parrott, when did you first beccr.e
associated with the CIA?
Mr. Parrott. In 1949, September of 1949.
Mr. Schwarz. And briefly, what was your career at the
Agency until you assumed a position in connection with the
so-called Special Group?
Mr. Parrott. Hell, I started out in the Office of Poliry
Coordination, which was a euphemism for, I guess, the Dirty '
Tricks Department. My first 30 b was as a Deputy to
in charge of planning. I did that for
about a year or so and than I became the Chief of the Operations
Staff of OPC. I moved from that to Deputy Director of the
Soviet Division at a time when as soon as they had merged witn
OPC and the action arm at 0S0, the secret intelligence arm.
| they put these together in 1952 and I was the Deputy Chief of
'the Soviet Division at that time. Z did that for two and a half
i
I
| years. I moved tc
: I came back from there in 1957 and was assigned as the so-called
I
Board Assistant to Allen Dulles for the Operations Coerdinat me
Board.
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Each of the principals of the OCB had an assistant. We
2
had our own meetings, too, to weed out some of the agenda and
3
so forth. That was a very time-consuming job.
4
This other Special Group thing was not very active during
5
the first year or two and it really didn't get into the kind
6
of operation that has since become until early '59, the beginning
7
of '59, when President Eisenhower directed the group to meet
8
at least once a week. Before that it had met quite sporadically.
9
There had not been much form to the meetings .
10
Mr. Schwarz. What function did you play in connection with
11
the Special Group?
12
Mr. Parrott. I was the Secretary.
13
Mr. Schwarz. And for what period of time did you have that?
14
Mr. Parrott. From '57 until October of '63. But as I
15
say between '57,. the middle of '57 and the beginning of '59
16
there was very little activity.
17
Mr. Schwarz. But from '59 to '63 you essentially did
18
meet once a week?
19
Mr. Parrott. Essentially once a week, yes.
20
Mr. Schwarz. Were you also the Secretary of the so-called
21
Special Group (Augmented) which was formed to deal with Cuba
22
in 1962?
23
Mr. Parrott. Yes, I wa3 and I was also the Secretary of
24
the Counterinsurgency Group for awhile. That got to be so
25
much paperwork where I finally had to get an assistant and shed
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much of that because the MONGOOSE and Special Group then
2
was fairly time-consuming.
3
Also, at that point I had a number of other duties with
4
General Maxwell Taylor in the White House, all involved with
5
Intelligence. But this was just one of them.
6
Mr. Schwarz. Were you an Agency employee throughout all
7
that time?
8
Mr. Parrott;. I was an Agency employee, Mr. Schwarz, but
9
I was on detail to the White House. I was on the White House
10
staff .
11
Mr, Schwarz. And there was nothing concealed about your
12
relationship with the Agency, in other words. People knew
13
that you were an agency employee but you were detailed to the
14
White House for this particular job.
15
Mr. Parrott. Oh, absolutely.
16
Mr. Schwarz. What, as you understood it, was the function
17
of the Special Group?
18
Mr. Parrott. Well, the Special Group was established under
19
what was essentially, what wa3 the charter for covert operations
20
in the government, namely NSC Document 10/2, which I believe
21
dated back to 1948 and was then rewritten in 1954 as 5412,
22
NSC 5412.
23
Those documents established this Committee. It was not
24
called the Special Group. I think I gave it that name, actually,
25
because Gordon Gray was unhappy about using the word 5412. It
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used to be called the 5412 Group, but this established a four-
member group consisting of representatives from State, Defense, ■
White House, and the DCI to pass on all significant covert
operations from a policy point of view.
Mr. Schwarz. Did you have any conversations with either
President Kennedy or President Eisenhower in which their
understanding of the function of the Special Group was conveyed
to you?
Mr. Parrott. Not directly from either one of those, no.
Gordon Gray did convey to us President Eisenhower's concern
at the end of '58. He thought that the Committee should be
more active than it had been and he directed that meetings
be held starting in the beginning of '59, that they be held •
once a week, at least.
But I never met President Eisenhower during that period
at all and although I had some meetings with President Kennedy,
these were never on covert operations on intelligence,
reconnaissance, that kind of thing.
Mr. Schwarz. Was it your understanding that all significant
covert action operations were meant to be evaluated, considered
and either approved or rejected by the Special Group before
they could be undertaken?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, indeed. We were so directed and I
believe the NSC papers say so too.
Mr . Schwarz . And to the best of your understanding was
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that direction complied with during the period of time that
you served as Secretary of the Special Group?
Mr, Parrott, Yes, religiously.
Mr. Schwarz. Do you know of any instances where it was
not complied with?
Mr. Parrott. No.
Mr. Schwarz. Do you know of any instances where either
President Eisenhower or President Kennedy instructed the
Central Intelligence Agency or any other agency of government
to carry out a covert operation without informing the Special
Group?
Mr. Parrott. I know of no such instance and I think it
would be highly unlikely. It would have been highly unlikely.
Mr. Schwarz. Why do you think it would be highly unlikely?
Mr. Parrott. Well, because I think that both Presidents,
and particularly President Eisenhower, as evidenced in his
sort of revitalization or vitalization of this Committee, were
highly conscious of the necessity to be protective, if you
will, in this field, and I just cannot conceive that either
one of them would have gone off and mounted some kind of covert
operation on his own. This certainly would not have been
consistent with President Eisenhower's staff method of doing
business, and I don't think that Kennedy would have done this
either because I think he realized the complexity of this,
particularly after the Bay of Pigs. But you can't let these
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things out of hand. And also, I think, to support my view is
a number of times when there was disagreement or perhaps
uncertainty among the members of the group, it would be referred I
to the President. We never reflected that fact. Well, we
did reflect it in the minutes but we always used the euphemism
for the President.
Mr. Schwarz . In the case of Eisenhower there was Mr.
Gray's associate?
Mr. Parrott. Yes.
Mr. Schwarz. And in the case of President Kennedy it
was higher authority?
Mr. Parrott. In fact, it was plural just to make it
more obfuscated.
Mr. Schwarz. Well, you slipped a couple of times and
made it singular but generally it was plural?
Mr. Parrott. Yeah, but on the other one it was "higher
authority," and the reason for this may seem a little childish
in retrospect but it’s pretty transparent, let’s face it. But
the reason for this is that the whole concept of covert
operations, the definition of covert operations, really, in the
NSC enabling documents says that a covert operation is one
that is so conducted that the hand of the United States will
not be revealed, or if revealed, can be plausibly denied. And
every operation had to be structured with that in mind, that
structure in mind. You had to have some kind of plausible denia!.
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Well, of course, even though these minutes were very
closely held, nonetheless, to have had it on the record that
the President had approved it, your plausible denial goes right
out the window, so that was the reason.
The Chairman , In other words, the plausible denial was
meant for the President that in the event that the ^connection
were established between the covert action and the United
States Government, it would still be possible for the President
to plausibly deny it.
Mr. Parrott. That is correct. And of course you are
quite right, Senator Church, that anybody getting ahold of
those minutes could hardly have said that Mr. Merchant nor
Ros Gilpatrick or somebody else didn't work for the U.S.
Government .
Actually, that rather ridiculous thesis was propounded in
Invisible” Government. where , A this was an invisible government
running all these things, when the invisible government turns
out to be the Undersecretary of State, the Deputy Secretary
of Defense, and so forth.
Senator Mondale. Mr. Parrott, as you look back on this
strategy of plausible denial, from what we know today, would
you not say it was a very naive expectation that undertaking
matters such as the Bay of Pigs and some of the other more
significant matters, to expect that you can somehow »
our government, and particularly the President of the United
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States, from being ultimately being held responsible or thought
to be responsible by most who looked at the situation?
Mr. Parrott. Senator Mondale, I don't think it was naive.
I really don't. I think that one of the fatal weaknesses of
the Bay of Pigs was that it went beyond the possibility of
plausible denial. It was simply too big. prhat could not be
plausibly denied, and of course that led into the so-called
Taylor Rule, that any paramilitary action that got beyond
that kind of a point, that is the point where it could be
plausibly denied — well, let me put it this way. That all
paramilitary actions would have to be reviewed by the Special
Group and if they concluded that it was too big, like the
Bay of Pigs, to be plausibly denied, then it would either be
sent or be referred to the Department of Defense or it would
not be done.
But on the others, I think that this did serve a useful
purpose but I think the emphasis is on the word "plausible. M
And maybe you're not fooling anybody, but at least it's plausibly
on the surface. And I think that is far better, it seems to
me far better than just not to ha- o any cover for it at all.
Mr. Schwarz. How about not doing things that you feel
you are ashamed of to have to admit it?
Senator Mondale. That's what I worry about because there
was this expectation, or at least the strategy was based on the
expectation of plausible denial, that it might have encouraged
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actions that would not have occurred had those who were the
real actors . expected'., accountability.
In other words, I think it is very easy to diminish in
one’s thinking moral and other considerations when you are
quite sure you're not going to get caught.
What is it, Samuel Johnson said a good conscience is
bottled on the notion that someone is looking, and the whole
theory of this is ^nat no one is looking and if they do look
they can't find out who did it.
I think human nature might, under those kinds of expectations
lead people to do things that they would never do if they
were to be held accountable.
Running through this, it seems to be kind of a naive
thing and of course history proves that that sordid deal with
the Mafia has not only come out, but it compromised a prosecutiofi
it is a major diplomatic disaster to this nation in the eyes
of the world, and I've got to believe that one .of the reasons
we thought that we could go through the Mafia was that no one
would ever find out. In fact, the Mafia was bragging about it
all over the country. Every time an FBI investigation was
launched they would say, oh, yeah, we work for the CIA. And
that should have been anybody that knows the Mafia would have
known that's exactly what they would do.
Mr. Parrott. Well, all I am competent to talk about is
what the Special Group deliberations were all about, and nothing!
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like that ever; appeared before the Special Group. How that
came about I don’t know, I've only read about it in the papers.
The Special Group would never have gotten into anything of that
kind .
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So I think you may be talking, I think you may well have
a point that people down the line, when viewed with a lot of
gung ho spirit might conceivably have had that attitude. But
what I was dealing with here were responsible government
officials who I don’t think would have taken that kind of
view.
Mr. Schwarz. You mentioned that a purpose of the Special
Group, or- the purpose of the Special Group, was to protect
*
the President and we have # been talking about a sense of protect?
plausible denial.
Was •. another purpose of the Special Group to protect
in the sense of providing a group of persons who could responsible
debate the different questions and come up with advice on how
to decide hard matters of policy for the United States
government .
Mr. Parrott. Well, that was the purpose. The purpose
of the group was not as you suggested in the beginning, war
not to protect the President. That was just a ground rule of
all covert operations and it was not just the President? it
was the United States.
Mr. Schwarz. Right. I
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Mr. Parrott. So I think that was purely incidental. The
purpose of the group was to have an input of all really basicalljf
concerned departments into the consideration of the covert
4 i action to see whether, to weigh the political risks and the
5 || form of political risks against the benefit to be gained. 1
6 || Mr. Schwarz. I thought that. I think we ought to clarify
7 || that since the protection led into the plausible denial.
8 |j Now did you know Allen Dulles well?
9 Mr. Parrott. Yes, I did,
10 Mr . Schwarz . And in what context did you know him?
11 Mr. Parrott. Well, I was really his assistant for these
12 two or three matters for four years. I saw him several times
13 a week for hours at a time. I had known him somewhat before -
14 as a Deputy Division Chief and a Base Chief, but I got to know
15 him very well indeed during these four years.
16 Mr. Schwarz. When you say assistant for these matters,
17 ky that you mean, don't you, his assistant in connection with
18 his workings with higher authority. I don't mean the President.
19 Mr, Parrott. The Special Group.
20 Mr. Schwarz. The Special Group.
21 Mr. Parrott. And also the operations coordinating work.
22 Mr * Schwarz. And you acquired through that contact with
23 Mr. Dulles an understanding of how he expressed himself.
24 Mr. Parrott. Yes.
25 Mr. Schwarz. We have had testimony from Mr. Bissell that
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speculated that, first that Mr. Dulles was told about the
contract with the Mafia. In fact, he didn't say he was speculatin
on that. He said he believed that to be true.
Second, he wanted to speculate that Mr. Dulles would have
g
gone to President Eisenhower without going to the Special
Group and would have talked to President Eisenhower about the
Mafia effort to assassinate Fidel Castro in a fashion which
he described as the use of circumlocutous , not using the word
I
kill.--? or assassinate or Mafia, but somehow through the use
i
of vague language ’ getting across to President Eisenhower
an understanding of what had been done without saying explicitly
what had been done.
Now are you, in light of your close work with Mr. Dulles,
capable of commenting upon that testimony?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I don't think I would entirely agree
with Bissell on that.
Allen Dulles was very conscious of his position in the
hierarchy. I mean by that ha was conscious of the limitations
of his position and that he was quite subservient to the
President on these matters, and indeed, in the Special Group
often took the position that he wanted to be told by the others
what to do. He wasn’t going to do it just with tacit approval
if it was a particularly sensitive thing,
1 find it hard to believe that he would try to fence to
this extent with the President. I have no knowledge of what
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he knew about the Mafia.
Mr. Schwarz. I know that. I was simply trying to get
your comment on the alleged method of communication.
Mr. Parrott. This would only be speculation, as I gather
Bissau* s was, but as I say I think his dealings would have been
fairly straightforward.
I remember, for instance, he used to tell us -- I *m not
sure this is exactly — but he used to warn us not to oversell
the Bay of Pigs, let*s say, and he would constantly talk about
an occasion when he did meet! with President Eisenhower about
Guatemala and Eisenhower asked him what the chances were of
success in Guatemala and I think he said it was one chance* in
four, 25 percent, or something like that. And he said that
Eisenhower ■ then said, all right, go ahead.
Now Eisenhower said in his own memoirs, he refers to this
instance and he said of Dulles, it said it was 75 percent, he
would not have done it, but he thought he was an honest man
with the 25 percent. And he used to exhort us all of the time
abotit 'don't oversell this idea to people in policy because that
is just as fatal. and you can always underplay these things.
As I say, *I'm not sure that*s entirely pertinent to what
you are asking but I think .\t indicates the way he operated
and I think would indicate th<& way he would be expected to
operate with the President.
Mr. Schwarz. All right. Now going back to the fall of
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I960, did Mr. Dulles ever tell you that he had communicated
2
privately to President Eisenhower that an assassination effort
5
against Fidel Castro was underway?
4 I
Mr. Parrott. No.
5
Mr. Schwarz. Do you believe that if Mr. Dulles had had
6
such a conversation with President Eisenhower that he would
7
have told you?
8
Mr. Parrott. I doubt it.
9
Mr. Schwarz. Are you capable of expressing an opinion
10
one way or the other as to whether he did have such a- conversatio
11
Mr. Parrott, I really have no opinion on that.
12
Mr. Schwarz. Now further testimony we have received has-
13
been that Mr. Dulles was told about the Mafia effort to
14
assassinate Mr. Castro in conversation in which the words used
15
were that ’an intelligence gathering operation involving the
16
Mafia had been agreed to and the conclusion by the person
17
who testified was that Mr. Dulles must have understood from
18
those words that an assassination effort was underway.
19
First, do you believe that Mr. Dulles would have accepted
20
a communication in circumlocutous terms, like intelligence
21
gathering operation," and believed that that was sufficient
22
to inform him that an assassination effort was underway?
23
Mr. Parrott. I can*t conceive that he would know. X
24
think if he was told that it was an intelligence gathering
25
operation, he would have expected it to be just exactly that.
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Mr. Schwarz. And he didn't communicate with people as
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far as your experience goes by winks or other subtle methods
5
of communications intended to accomplish meanings other than
* »
the words themselves?
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Mr. Parrott. No. I think despite the legend that has
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grown up about Allen Dulles, that he was a very devious man
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and had a cloak drawn around him most of the time, I did not
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find him that way at all.
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Mr. Schwarz. So it would have been your opinion that if
10
those were the words used in the meeting with Mr. Dulles, it
11
would not have been communicated to him that there was an
12
assassination attempt against Mr. Castro?
13
Mr. Parrott. Well, of course, this is terribly hypothetical.
14
Mr. Schwarz. I understand that.
15
Mr. Parrott. But I would not expect Mr. Dulles to read
16
into anybody's statement that this was an intelligence gathering
17
operation, to read into that that this was an assassination
18
attempt .
19
Mr . Schwarz . Now would you show the witness as Parrott
20
Exhibit No. 1 the first in a series of Special Group Minutes?
21
Well, before I do that, when you took the minutes you
22
testified that you did use at least one euphemism which was
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higher- authority or Mr. Gray »s associate instead of the name
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or the title of the President.
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Did you use other euphemisms?
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Mr. Parrott. No, I think not. I think not.
Mr, Schwarz. This is the November 3rd,; 1960 minutes of
the Special Group Meeting signed by Mr. Parrott, and I particular
want to call your attention to the third page. And there's
a statement that: “Finally, Mr. Merchant asked whether any
real planning has been done for taking direct positive action
against Fidel, Raul and Che Guevara. He said without these
three the Cuban Government would be leaderless and probably
brainless. He conceded that it would be necessary to act
against all three simultaneously. General Cabell" — who
was the Deputy to the DCI — "pointed out that action of
this kind is uncertain of results and highly dangerous in
conception and execution, because the instruments must be '
Cubans. He felt that, particularly because of the necessity
of simultaneous action, it would have to be concluded that Mr.
Merchant's suggestion is beyond our capabilities . "
(The document referred to
was marked Parrott's
Exhibit No. 1 for
identification . )
1 .
UNCLASSIFIED
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Mr. Schwarz. Now do you read the words "direct positive
action" and "action of this kind" and "act against all three
simultaneously" and "the necessity of simultaneous action"
as meaning the killing of Castro, Castro and Che Guevara?
Mr. Parrott. Well, let me say first this was 15 years
ago and I don't reall_ remember details of this conversation.
We had hundreds of meetings of this kind with maybe seven or
eight major items on them, so I really don't remember the
particular discussion.
However, to answer your question directly, no, I never
used euphemisms of this kind. The only time I ever used them
was the instances you cite about higher authority and associates
The Chairman, How do you read these words, Mr. Parrott,
as a person coming cold to these words would almost necessarily
be led by the words to the conclusion that the subject under
discussion was that of assassinating these three leaders and
that it was rejected, that is how the words speak?
Mr. Parrott, Well, I think you have to view this, Senator,
in the context of continuing weekly meetings and discussions.
I obviously could not record each time all this stuff had gone
one before. I think everybody in these meetings knew what
was being talked about, and what was being talked about in my
view was something like a palace revolution.
Before I go through this I might as well say I don't
recall that any time any discussion in the Special Group of
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assassination at any time, so that this was meant, I believe,
to mean some kind of a coup*
Mr. Schwarz. The deposal, the political deposal of these
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three?
Mr. Parrott. That's right.
The Chairman. Now. you wrote' these words, didn't^you?
— Mr Parrott. Yes, I did.
The Chairman. And you ‘testify now that to the best of
your recollection that the subject of assassination did not
come up at these meetings and that this paragraph was not
meant to refer to the possibility of assassination and the
rejection of that possibility on the grounds that the government
lacked the assets to accomplish it.
Is that your testimony?
Mr. Parrott. That is my testimony. Yes, exactly.
Mr. Schwarz. Well, see, this document is a good one to
start with because there is an explanation given and it turns
out that in this document the action is turned down.
Now you say it means a palace coup* Are palace coups
beyond our capabilitites? Hasn't the United States accomplished
palace coups, Guatemala, Iran, many other countries?
Isn't it assassination that General Cabell was saying is
beyond our means?
Mr. Parrott* Nov I think not, Mr* Schwarz. You see, I
don't think this is comparable to Guatemala and Iran, with
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which we had reasonably friendly relations. This Cuba was
a closed society at this time and the operational situation
was totally different.
So that what General Cabell was saying there was that
we simply did not have agents inside of Cuba to carry out this
kind of a palace coup. As I am sure you know, the Cubans
developed a security system that was comparable to the Soviet
security system. They had a block system.
Mr. Schwarz. At this time or after the Bay of Pigs?
Mr. Parrott. No, at this time. As soon as Castro came
in. And. they had a -block system so that anybody that moved
into a block, was ..reported on by his neighbors. And it was a
very, very difficult thing to overcome.
That is really one of the. reasons why they had to go to
the Bay of Pigs. It had to be an external kind of a thing
because it just wasn't possible to develop these kinds of
assets .
As I say, you can't compare to the others. Actually,
Guatemala was a sort of paramilitary external operation. Iran
was a totally different thing where we had complete access to
people. But this was — now you see this was an Iron Curtain
country. This was almost like trying to produce a palace coup
in Hungary.
That is what Cabel." was talking about.
Mr. Schwarz. Well, let's pick a country that wasn't an
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Iron Curtain country, the Congo.
Would you mark as Exhibit 2 the Specif
which is at Tab W of the smaller book with the flexible black
cover .
(The document referred
to was marked Parrott
Exhibit No. 2 for
identification . )
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Senator Mondale. Could I ask Mr. Parrott — this sentence
appears: "He conceded that it would be necessary to act
against all three simultaneously."
Wouldn't you say that someone looking at these notes fresh
i might conclude that you are talking about not the overthrow
of the government but other assassination?
Mr. Parrott. I suppose it's conceivable that you might
infer that, I believe, in 1975, but that, I can assure you,
was not what was being talked about in 1960.
You see the point there was it would be no good to . remove
Castro alone in a palace coup, or whatever, through assassination
because Raul or Che would take over. You would have to get
rid of them. Short of assassination you would have to get
rid of them all at the same time otherwise it would be
useless because there was a triumvirate and there seemed to be
at least, we thought they were pretty much at the time inter-
changeable .
Senator Mondale. Well, were there several others under
Raul and Che you could easily have taken over?
Mr. Parrott. They! were.- the..' most'-iimportant; -.obviously' that's
case in any kind of a coup. Obviously there are other layers
below. And as X recall it I don't believe that we were able
to identify any reasonable man to take over underneath. I'm
a little hazy on this but those three were absolutely in
control at the time, and that was, I think, the kind of —
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Mr. Schwarz. Let’s turn to non-block countries , the Congo.
Would you mark as Exhibit 2 the minutes of August 25 , I960,
reflecting a meeting of the Special Group that is signed by
yourself.
All right, now you see the reference to the Congo on the
first page?
Mr. Parrott. Uh huh.
Mr. Schwarz. And at the beginning there is a discussion
of an operational line by you and by Mr. Dulles for an anti-
Lumumba campaign in the Congo.
Do you see that?
Mr. Parrott. Right.
Mr. Schwarz. And that involved a number of efforts to
discredit or undermine Mr. Lumumba’s power in the Congo.
Is that a fair assessment? Is that a fair assessment of
what the beginning discussion was?
Mr. Parrott. Yes.
Mr. Schwarz. Then Mr. Gray interjects to say that
eliminating the euphemism, President Eisenhower "expressed
extremely strong feelings on the necessity for very straight-
forward action in this situation, and he wondered, whether the
plans as outlined were sufficient."
"Mr. Dulles replied that he had taken the comments referred
to seriously and had every intention of proceeding as vigorously
as the situation permits or requires, but added that he must
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necessarily put himself in a position of interpreting instructior
of this kind within the bounds of necessity and capability.
It was finally agreed that planning for the Congo would not
necessarily rule out 1 consideration 1 of any particular kind
of activity which might contribute to getting rid of Lumumba. 11
Mr. Parrott. Uh huh.
Mr. Schwarz. Now wasn't one of the kinds of activity
which was within that agreement as to planning reflected in
this document the killing of Lumumba?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I suppose you could read that. I don't
recall. As I said, I can only repeat. I may have to repeat
it several times, that there was never any discussion in this
m
group, to ray recollection, of assassination.
The Chairman. Now when you say that, Mr. Parrott, it is
terribly important for us to have your testimony in insisting
that you're interpreting these written words, as you understand.
Mr. Parrott. Of course.
The Chairman. And when you say there was never any
discussion of assassination, as such, do you mean that it was
simply beyond the pale of consideration or do you mean that
the discussion of a plan to use whatever means might be available
for removing Mr. Lumumba was understood, though not explicitly
discussed, as including the possibility of assassination?
Mr. Parrott. No, I do not think it was understood.
Mr. Schwarz. I see. I want your testimony to be very
UNCLASSIFIED
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clear *
Mr. Parrott. No, I think it was not understood and if
I could go on for a second. I notice you*ve got on the line
here "straightforward action" “ and • "getting rid of - Lumumba . "
The reason this was described as very straightforward
action is because these are relatively mild kinds of things,
Mr. Schwarz. The kinds of things discussed in here?
Mr. Parrott. Yes. Operations with trade unions, a vote
of no confidence, and operations through independent neighbor
groups .
These are relatively mild. I think what they were saying
here was that we might want to go further than that and •
perhaps arm some dissidents, or something of that kind. But
it is not meant to include assassination.
Mr. Schwarz. All right, now assume —
Mr. Parrott. Excuse me. Could I conclude for just a
second?
You see, after all we're talking here about overthrowing
a leader. This is always a very sensitive kind of thing and
particularly so in the Congo, much more than Cuba, because
by this time we were really in an adversary situation with
Cuba. That was not necessarily true with the Congo. As I
recall, we really didn't know all that much about Lumumba.
So it is never something to be done lightly to consider
overthrowing a foreign leader, and that is why we use this kind
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of language.
The Chairman, Now as a corollary of that observation
would it follow that if assassination of Lumumba himself were
under consideration,, that it would have been dealt with in
explicit terms?
Mr, Parrott. I think so, yes. There was no hanky panky
in this group, really. Euphemisms and the rest of it and
circumlocutions and so forth gust really Weren't; a part. of :fchxs
operation.
The Chairman. It is very understandable to me that when
you wrote up the notes on a matter of this sensitivity, that
if an assassination or a plan for assassination were under
m
consideration, you would not refer to it as such in the
written notes, and that is why we are asking for your direct
testimony based upon your best recollection of the time and
the meetings.
Mr. Parrott. I cannot really testify what I would have
put in the minutes or would not have put in the minutes if I
they talked about assassination because it was not talked about.
Mr. Schwarz. No, we are going to come to, although I
think we should reserve it for a moment —
Mr. Parrott. Although I am quite sure I would have
recorded it as such because this is meant to be a working document
The Chairman. I see.
• Mr. Schwarz. Well, let's aome to it now. y
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UNCLASSIFIED
28
Have you had your attention called to a meeting of the
Special Group (Augmented) that took place on August 10th in
1962?
Senator Mondale. Are you going to go into Castro?
Mr. Schwarz. I was going to try to follow up whether
he always recorded everything.
Senator Mondale, Because we're going to go back to
Lumumba , aren't we?
Mr. Schwarz. Yes, but why don't you follow up?
Senator Mondale. You see, we see these notes that you
took of these meetings which are somewhat ambiguous and which,
in my opinion, are capable of being construed as talking about,
assassination. And we have to look at those notes as well*
in terms of other things we know that happened.
For example, we have the testimony of Mr. Robert Johnson
who said that he was at a meeting with Mr. Eisenhower at
which Mr. Eisenhower said — I no longer remember the exact
words — "it came across to me as an order for the assassination
of Lumumba . who was then at the center of political controversy,
and I'm quoting him directly, "There was no discussion; the
meeting simply moved on. I remember my sense at thatT moment
quite clearly because the President's statement came *
as a great shock to me."
Then we know at the same time Mr. Bissell, who was then
the DDP , ordered a Mr. O'Donnell to kill Mr. Lumumba, and Mr.
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O'Donnell refused to do so. .Asked., him to do it and he
refused to do it. And after that an asset was placed in
Stanleyville, or wherever they go over there, someone who was
a known assassin'. and poison- was • sent .
So we look at those things and — can you help us sort
that out?
Mr. Parrott. Well, all I can say. Senator Mondale, is
I know nothing about this meeting with Eisenhower or any
request from Bisseli. There's probably no particular reason
why I would have.
Senator Mondale. You were at the CIA at that time,
were you not?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, I was, but see, I was not at that pirne
really on the operational side. It’ was really just a staff
job, assisting, really working between Allen Dulles and the
division chiefs essentially.
Well, perhaps I probably would not have been in that kind
of discussion.
The chairman. Did you, in your capacity during this
period, attend the meetings of the National Security Council?
Mr. Parrott. No.
Senator Baker. Mr. Chairman, would the Senator yield on
this point?
Senator Mondale. Sure.
Senator Baker. We had somewhat the same situation with the
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Castro assassination efforts. We know, for instance, that
there were repeated efforts to assassinate Castro. We know that
at least Mr* Helms conceived that that was in the scope of
his authority. We know that Mafia members were solicited and
employed to carry out certain of these projects. We know that
the Special Group (Augmented) minutes and the National Security
Council mtnutes never reflect any direct authority, unquestioning
authority, in this respect. We know that these people were
substantial members of two Administrations, the ones I have
just spoken of, and we inferred that it is unlikely that people
of that calibre would act irresponsibly.
Now my question is do you know of any so-called back
channel or any other method of communication between a President
or someone acting for a President in the intelligence community
that could help us rationalize these apparent conflicts?
Mr. Parrott, Well, Senator Baker, I don't know of any
established channel. Of course, the two DCIs that were
involved during this period, these two or three years, obviously
met with the President very often on a number of subjects.
I was never present. I was, as I said earlier, with
President Kennedy on several intelligence matters but not
operational matters, never with Eisenhower.
X have no idea what was discussed at those times between
the President and the DCI. I do know that neither — well,
actually after Mr. McCone came in I was in the White House so
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I would not have been that close to him. Mr. Dulles never
reported to me any such instruction from the President, and
of course there is no particular reason, perhaps, why he
should .
Senator Baker. Well, I hope you can see why I'm perturbed
by it.
Mr. Parrott. Yes, I can see. what you're getting at.
Senator Baker. It seems to me it's leading us to a place
where we have two difficult choices — either the Agency was
acting on its own in a. very r very irresponsible- and destructive
way to the interest of the United States , or there was another
less formal manner of communication that we have not yet
identified. But we have no evidence of that "except my gnawing,
belief that these things would not have been undertaken by.
men of this calibre unless they had some sort of authority.
But since you don't know I won't press you any further for
such information. But if you can point us in the right direction
I would sure like to have it. I would like to see what else
we can develop.
Mr. Schwarz. We had, Senator Baker, before you came in
some testimony that is relevant to your questions and Mike,
you ought to make sure the Senator sees the section before he
came in at some point.
Senator Baker. What section is this?
*
The Chairman. You'll get it from the transcript. It had
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to do with Mr. Parrott* s familiarity with Mr. Dulles* s methods,
and it had to do with the general subject of circumlocution
that has come up from time to time*.
All right, now let's proceed.
Mr. Schwarz. All right. Now you stated, I believe, that
first in response to Senator Church's question that you did.
not use euphemisms to diguise the fact that the assassinations
were discussed and you indeed testified that to your recollection
assassinations were not discussed.
Now have you had your attention called to a meeting of
the Special Group (Augmented) which took place on August 10th,
1962?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, I have.
Mr. Schwarz. All fight. Now at that meeting was the.
subject of assassination raised?
Senator Baker. Is this the meeting at the State Department?
Mr. Schwarz. It f s the meeting we spent a lot of time on,
which was probably at the State Department, which was probably
at the Joint, although some people have said it was at the
Joint Chiefs.
The Chairman. Do we have the minutes?
Mr. Schwarz. Yes. The minutes of the meeting are Tab 38 -b-
of the Lansdale book.
Senator Baker, Fritz, do we know for sure this is the
only meeting on that day? We have no evidence that there were
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Mr. Schwarz. We have no evidence there were two meetings.
This is ? . 'tabv 38'4-B r ,- and will you mark that as Parrott
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UNCLASSIFIED
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Mr. Schwarz. Now the minutes contain no reference to an
assassination discussion.
Is that right? Do you agree with that?
Mr. Parrott. This is correct.
Mr. Schwarz. Now assassination was discussed at that
meeting, wasn't it?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I don't recall it being discussed.
However, well, I read the paper about Lansdale's memo and I've
seen Harvey's memorandum commenting on Lansdale's memorandum,
so I can only conclude that, I can only conclude that McNamara
must have said something of this sort.
I think it is important to remember, though, that these
minutes were not intended to be a verbatim transcript of
everything that was said at these meetings. Now we had 15 ’or
16 pepple there, all of them well informed in particular fields,
all of them highly articulate.
This meeting, as I recall, went on for several hours. Ther^
was a great deal said at that meeting that, obviously, I didr
not record in the minutes because the purpose of these minutes
was really to serve as an action document to indicate the
decisions that were made and where appropriate, to give the
argumentation leading up to a pro and con.
There, obviously, were a great many things in all of these
meetings, particularly in an enormous meeting like this. A
lot of things were said that never floated, and therefore, I
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didn't record it.
You see, if you wanted a verbatim transcript, you should
have had a tape recorder and a stenographer to take it down,
but I don't think that would have been very helpful.
The reason I was there was to interpret what the decisions
were and to record those and to use them as a useful action
document.
Now I 'm sure that particularly in a group like this that
there were a great many proposals made that were just shot
down immediately. I do not remember this particular thing
of McNamara's, Frankly, I don 't. remember at all. I can only
infer from seeing the Army memorandum and hearing about the
Lansdale memorandum that McNamara obviously must have said,
something of this kind and that it was immediately shot down.
I find it hard to believe that he said it all that seriously.
As I said, I don't recall. And I think it is quite clear
in my mind that it never got off the ground. And therefore,
I did not record it.
Senator Baker, Mr. Chairman, could I ask a question in
that respect?
The Chairman. Of course.
Senator Baker. This is a matter that we've discussed among
ourselves and between members of the Committee and staff.
Statements of this sort intrigue me because they also lend
themselves to more than one interpretation.
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Does that mean assassinations were not discussed because
assassinations were not to be discussed? Or does; that mean
that the idea of assassinations was so odious and out of bounds
that you can’t conceive of these people talking about it even
under any circumstances?
Mr. Parrott. No, I don’t mean that, Senator. I guess, as
I said, it seemed to be quite clear that McNamara must have
said something. It appears quite clear. from reading his own
memoranda that McNamara must have said something about
assassinations .
So obviously they were not out of bounds to raise.
Senator Baker. But since it was shot down quickly, do
you imply that it was shot down because you said a bad word,
assassination?
Mr, Parrott. Oh, no. I’m implying it was shot down
because nobody thought that it was a proper course of action
to take .
Mr. Schwarz. That's not something you would remember, is
it? You said you didn’t remember.
Mr. Parrott. Well, as I said, I can only infer this
because this would have been the way I would have operated.
I think the way they would have operated and I think without
getting into an ad hominem thing here, I think Ed Lansdale is
a very literal man. Lansdale was working for McNamara. I
think it is entirely conceivable that Lansdale simply did not
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fit the sense of this meeting on that particular point and
went ahead on his own and said this is what McNamara wants,
not realizing that it had been shot down.
Now that may seem peculiar but I'll cite you an example
of how this happened.
A good many times, not in a meeting, with all this many
people wanting to be heard, in the regular meetings of the
Special Group when you had only the four principal members,
projects would be explained and defended, I suppose, by CIA
Division Chiefs. They would come in only for that particular
item and would then leave.
Time after time before I got the minutes out I would get
back to my office before I could -start dictating these minutes
and I would find a flock of telephone calls from these Division
Chiefs who would say, what did they decide? And because they
weren't use to the way there was a certain amount of oral
shorthand in these meetings because the people met every week.
They knew what they were talking about. They all had a common
background which the fellow coming in cold did not have.
So I would often spend an hour or so trying to explain to
each Division Chief what the decision was when he had been there
He simply didn't understand it.
So I can suggest as a possible explanation for this Ed
Lansdale simply didn't understand what had happened there, and
II can only infer this because I can't remember.
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38
UNCLASSIFIED
The Chairman. Let me go back to what you said a few
minutes ago when I asked you how you would handle or how you
thought you would have [handled the subject of assassination,
had it ever surfaced at one of these meetings.
I remember, I think you said in response you thought you
would have record a it had that ever happened. Now we have a
case where testimony and documents show that the subject did
at least surface and your minutes of the meetings make reference
to it.
How do you reconcile that with your previous testimony?
Mr, Parrott, Well, I just said a moment ago. Senator
Church, these were not intended to be a verbatim transcript
of what, of everything that was said there. I am sure there _
are many other things that were said there, particularly at •
a meeting of this size, that I did not record because these
are not intended to be that. They are intended to be an action
document, a record of decisions made.
In this case I can only infer that it was just ruled out.
The Chairman. Well, just to help me —
Mr. Parrott. I'm sure there were a lot of other things
that were said that I didn f t —
The Chairman. Just do let me understand your testimony.
Did you mean previously that had the subject of assassination
come up and had a decision been made to explore the possibility
or to lay out a contingency plan in the event that later such
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a decision might be made, that in that case you would have put
it down?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, that's what I mean, yes.
The Chairman, But if the subject had simply popped up
and been shot down, so to speak, you would not have felt it
necessary to include it in the minutes.
Is that what you're saying?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, I think that's essentially what it is,
yes. And in this case — excuse me, Senator. You see there
were a lot of people here at this meeting that didn't normally
get concerned, or some people that didn't get concerned with
this kind of thing.- And therefore, I am sure that there must "
have had, I think I recall that meeting really being quite" a
hodgepodge where everybody wanted to have his say and much
of it was not, as I pointed out, was not particularly helpful
because they hadn't been exposed to this kind of thing. Half
of these people were in that kind of category. So I just
didn't record it.
Senator Mondale. Mr. Parrott, I don't want to go over
old ground but I think you testified on the record that you
have no recollection of anyone, including Secretary McNamara,
mentioning assassination at that meeting or any other meeting.
Mr. Parrott. I have no recollection of it. -
Senator Mondale. Isn't assassination a sufficiently
severe and unusual suggestion that if it were' mentioned it would
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1 shave made an impression on you?
Mr. Parrott. I think so. Yes, I do.
Senator Mondale. And when you say that McNamara brought
4 jit up, you do so based on looking at the records shown here
5 j and not on the basis of any recollection?
6
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Mr. Parrott. That is correct.
Senator Mondale. Is it possible in your opinion that
it was brought up, that these records do not accurately reflect
the meeting?
Mr. Parrott. It is certainly possible, yes, I think it
is certainly possible, although I gather that Harvey also
said he had heard these words,
*>
Senator Mondale. Yes, Well, we’ve had testimony from'"
people who were at the meeting who said it was brought up.
Mr. Parrott. And I believe McCone testified to it, but
I simply do not remember it.
Senator Mondale. Well, you see, we go right back to the
Lumumba kind of thing and try to understand this. It was
just as with the Lumumba notes. We know, in fact, orders were
given to assassinate Mr. Lumumba. Both the person who gave
the orders and the person who received them testified to that
effect. Plus this testimony about Mr. Eisenhower.
Similarly, we know in fact that orders were given to
assassinate Mr. Castro and that the next day Mr. Lansdale,
a General of the U.S. Army, wrote notes to the CIA asking them
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to prepare such plans and a day later Mr. Harvey wrote a bitter
note to Lansdale, not objecting to assassination but objecting
to placing assassinations on the record.
So when you say it didn’t get off the ground, it sure as
hell did* So you’ve got the fact that it happened. You have
j the fact that people remembered it^being mentioned
l.You have
these memoranda. And it’s very hard for us to try to put two
and two together.
Mr. Parrott. Well, I would not agree that it got off
the ground becauf Mr. McNamara was not calling the shots in
these meetings and Mr. McNamara hardly ever attended these
meetings. He delegated this.
Senator Mondale. Yeah, if the Secretary of Defense comes
to one of those meetings, even jȣ they rarely attended them,
and said, I don’t know, I don’t want to speak, I don’t know
what he said. But surely, when the Ser rotary of Defense says
something that would be significant, wouldn’t it?
Mr. Parrott. It might be significant but in my view the
others did not agree with him and I believe Mr. McCone has
so testified from reading the newspaper. But this is not the
first time that Lansdale did this kind of thing. Lansdale on
several occasions issues so-called instructions to CIA to
do this, which had to be recalled because they simply were not
right. They did not reflect what was said on several occasions
The Chairman. Can you be more specific?
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Mr. Parrott. No, I cannot, Senator. I don't remember the
subjects particularly, but this was the way. Lansdale operated,
Mr. Schwarz. But something was recalled after he had
issued some instructions to the Agency, without remembering
what it was you do remember that the Special Group acted to, j
in ef feet ,, rescind or recall some instructions?
Mr. Parrott. Well, in* some cases I think Mr. McCone just
sent it back to him and said this wasn't what was decided
and we 1 re not going to do it this way. On occasion Lansdale
would call me up or would send me a note saying the minutes
of your MONGOOSE meeting of such and such a date are incorrect.
You've got to make them say this- or that.
On these occasions I would confer with General Taylor,
who was the Chairman of the group and on no occasion did we
ever change any of them because he was wrong. Lansdale was
simply wrong.
Senator Mondale. Well, what kind of protection mechanism
in the light of this pattern did you have for recalling? Did
you know or was he required to submit his memoranda to the
Special Group (Augmented) so you would know?
Mr. Parrott. No, we didn't. He freewheeled a good deal
but Mr. McCone, after .all> was a member of it. Mr. McCone was
on the receiving end of this kind of memorandum usually, and
because that's where the operational capability was. And McCone
I know on more than one occasion, simply sent it back to
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UNCLASSIFIED
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Lansdale and said, this ain't the way it was.
Senator Mondale. Well, we 1 re in a terrible spot here because
either top leaders or the people down below did it and we
have testimony that Helms and Bissell agreed not to tell McCone
what they were doing. So either we've got kind of a private
government operating at the subterranean level beyond everyone's
reach, or — well, our job is to try to sort this out. And
of all the people, you're the most crucial witness because somecr
describes you as the best notetaker in America.
Mr. Parrott. Well, evidently I wasn't because you find
these ambiguities.
Senator Mondale. Well> I believe that's why you were
picked.
Mr. Parrott. Well, I'm sorry. I don't accept that, -
Senator.
Mr. Smothers. Mr. Parrott, I have some further problem
with your plausible explanation of what happened and how
Lansdale got misguided.
I believe you said in your testimony that he worked for
McNamara and therefore probably gave more emphasis than others
would* ha.Ve*“ to- McNamara ' s , comments .
Isn't it the truth that at this time he did not work for
O i
McNamara but in fact was working for the Attorney General or
the Attorney General and Maxwell Taylor, at best, and — well.
go ahead .
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i Mr. Parrott. No, I don't really think so, Mr. Smothers,
i
if there really was an Air Force General, He was quartered in
the Pentagon. He had always been in the Pentagon except when
I
| he was out of Washington.
i
I think that he felt that he was a Defense man.
I Now it is true that —
I
Mr. Smothers. Despite the fact that he had been named
Chief of Operations by the President?
Mr. Parrott. Yes. He was picked by the Kennedy brothers
to be Chief of Operations, and as such, yes, he did have
considerable responsibility to the MONGOOSE group. But I
think he also felt that he had a responsibility within the“
Pentagon.
Mr. Smothers. All right. Then taking, even if we
accept your hypothesis here that he was attaching undue
significance to McNamara's remarks, how do you account for
Mr. Harvey's remarks that not only corroborate Lansdale's
impressions but go further with respect to what the grouP
actually intended?
Would you mark the information at 38-F of the Lansdale
materials?
Mr. Schwarz. We'll mark that as Exhibit 4.
(The document referred to
was marked Parrott . Exhibit
No. 4 for identification.)
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Mr. Smothers. This will be Parrott 4, MEMORANDUM FOR:
Deputy Director (Plans) , dated 14 August, 1962, signed by
William K. Harvey.
Reading from that memorandum, paragraph two, and X quote:
‘'Reference is made to our conversation on 13 August, 1962,
concerning the memorandum of that date from General Lansdale_.
Attached is a copy of this memorandum, excised from which
are four words in the second line of the penultimate paragraph
on page 1. These four words were including liquidation of
leaders. ,,,
Paragraph three indicates: "The .question of assassination,
*
particularly of Fidel Castro, was brought up by Secretary
McNamara at the meeting of the Special Group (Augmented) in
Secretary Rusk's office on 10 August. It was the obvious
consensus at that meeting in answer to a comment by Mr. Ed
Murrow, that this is not a subject which has been made a
matter of official record."
Harvey continues: "I took careful notes on the comments
at this meeting on this point, and the Special Group (Augmented)
is not expecting any written comments or study on this point."
Now how do you reconcile the seemingly clear commentary
by Mr, Harvey here with your own conclusion that Lansdale was
merely giving improper or certainly significance out of context
Mr. McNamara's remarks?
Senator Baker. Well, in that context, before you answer,
UNCLASSIFIED'
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the following paragraph was also noted:
f. ‘’Upon receipt of the attached memorandum,- I called Lansdale*
’office and, in his absence, pointed out to Frank Hand the
inadmissibility and stupidity of putting this type of comment
s .in writing in such a document. I advised Frank Hand that as
6 ! far as the CIA was concerned, we would write no document pertainir
7 ! to this and would oarticipate in no open meeting discussing
!
8 lit. I strongly urged Hand to recommend to Lansdale that he
9 .i excise the phrase in question from all copies of this memorandum
10 'I including those disseminated to State, Defense, and US I A.' 1
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Only as an addition to Mr. Smothers* question, it seems
to me that the clear import of that Harvey memorandum is not
that assassinations weren’t discussed or not to be discussed,
but they weren*t meant to be reduced to writing and you ought
not to have "open meetings” or meetings in which you discuss
it.
Are there closed meetings where you do discuss it?
Mr. Parrott. No. Again, I really hate to gat into an
ad hominem sort of comment here, but I think you are requiring
me to do so,
I would say that Harvey alsowas a rather peculiar man.
Harvey didn't always get these things straight. Harvey was
an operator, a field operator. He was not a Washington staff
man, and he stubbed his toe a number of times. He just really
didn't carry out what the group wanted him to do.
UNCLASSIFIED
I
47
S; j'j J'. >'<*-
I !cn't "'can that he did things that didn’t appear, but
he was never able in Maxwell Taylor’s view to follow through
on what Taylor wanted him to do because he was not really a
staff man. And I repeat that I just think he’s wrong about
o this.
6 Senator Baker. When did you first see this memorandum?
7 - Mr, Parrott. Last night.
!
8 j Senator Baker. You’ve never seen it before?
9 j Mr. Parrott. I’ve never seen it before. You see, there’s
i
10 1 no reason why I would have. It’s an internal CIA memorandum
j
i
11 from Harvey to Dick Helms,
Mow I was in the White House; I wasn’t in the CIA.
13 [\ Senator Baker. This memo was dated 14 August, 1962 ,
14 almost 13 years later, and this is the first time I know of
I
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that anyone had challenged the authenticity or accuracy of it.
Helms apparently didn’t.
Mr. Parrott. Well, Helms wasn’t at the meeting,
Mr. Smothers. Well, let me understand what you’re saying.
You’re saying Lansdaie’s wrong, Harvey was wrong, McCone was
wrong.
Mr. Parrott. I’m not saying that. I don’t know what
McCone said.
Mr. Schwarz. McCone is a little more consistent with him
in that he said that it was shot down.
Senator Baker. But McCone also cautioned us, if you will
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, remenber, of be careful of the testimony of Lansdale and Harvey.
‘ I wondered at the tine --
i
| Mr. Parrott. You say McCone said that? Well.
; Senator 3aker. I was wondering why McCone, X was wondering
b .why he was warning us about those things in advance.
1
6 | Mr. Parrott. Well, I must say that I 'm glad having
7 embarked on this trecherous soil myself to see that I was
8 ; preceded by John McCone because both of these guys were very
I
9 , strange fellows. Lansdale was totally miscast in this job.
i
10 Senator Baker. Well, why was he there? This was an
11 j extremely sensitive operation? Why did you have a couple of
12 kooks there operating?
13 Mr. Parrott. Well, I'll tell you exactly why. Well, I'm
!
14 [ not sure they were kooks. The reason Lansdale was there was
15 because Lansdale had achieved some kind of a reputation in
15 the Phillipines: in connection with the Huks, really a
i
17 political action kind of thing. He may have been in Vietnam
13 | before at this stage. I'm not sure he was there later.
19 j In any event, he appealed to the Kennedy brothers.
20 Senator Baker. .And they chose him.
21 Mr. Parrott. And they are the ones who chose him. The
22 reason he was miscast, among other reasons, the reason he was
23 miscast was because the MONGOOSE operations were essentially
24 operations designed to, I think the word was used a number of
25 times, was to keep the pot simmering. In actual fact, nobody
T UNCLASSIFIED
«^ 88d , p ? FL -
i
JFK~*Col lection: HSCA (RG 233)
UNCLASSIFIED
really knew what to do after the Bay of Pigs, and the idea
was to, as I say, keep the pot simmering, infiltrate agents
I
! who would give you intelligence and might be prepared to do
!
’ sabotaae and so forth. This involved what was known in the
.trade as maritime operations largely. That is, putting agents
i
! ashore, blacks, you know, illegal agents, putting them ashore,
i This is a technique Harvey did know something about. Lansdale
{didn't know the first thing about this, and his expertise,
J
j if any, had been in the political action field and the HUks
ij
‘J and so on. And it quickly became evident that Lansdale was
J miscast .
j However, this was a difficult, plus his other personal
i !
i
J characteristics of running off rather half-cocked and being
j
! rather impressed with his title of Chief of Operations. This
i
.! quickly became evident to John McCone and to Max Taylor and
s others. But it was a difficult thing to replace him because
he was a personal nominee of the Kennedy brothers.
Senator Baker. Do you think he might not have been
miscast? Do you think there's any possibility that you and
^ John McQane and General Taylor were being bypassed and that
! the White House was operating directly to Lansdale and
Harvey?
Mr. Parrott. I don't think so. While we're on the
I subject, I'll give you one example of Lansdale's perspicacity.
| He had a wonderful plan for getting rid of Castro. This plan
UNCLASSIFIED
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consisted .~>f :;pre id in 7 the word that the Second Corning of Christ
•' was imminent and that Christ was against Castro. He was anti-
•• 'Christ. And you would spread this word around Cuba, and then
on whatever date it was, that there would be a manifestation
b of this thing. And at that time -- this is absolutely true --
6 ; and at that time there would be an American submarine which
7 j would surface just over the horizon off of Cuba and send up
3 1 some starshells. And this would be the manifestation of the
o 0
*
9 j Second Coming and Castro would be overthrown in favor of
\
10 ’ religious
11 j Senator Baker. Is that part of the operation that they
12 ! were going to make Castro* s beard fall off?
13 ‘ Mr. Parrott. Well, some wag called this operation- — ■
14 ; by this time Lansdale was something of a joke in many quarters
15 | and somebody dubbed this Elimination by Illumination.
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15 j Senator Baker. Is there, Mr. Parrott, any record any
i
17 ! place of that plan that you know of? Well, I might ask counsel --
1
1
13 Mr. Schwarz. Well, we've seen reference to some religious
19 efforts, but there were some prayers that were designed to
20 overthrow.
21 It-: is '.purportedly .in the sense that, there .
22 was religious thinking in Lansdale* s mind. I don’t think I've
23 seen .that particular- -plan .
. • - o
o ;
Mr. Aaron. Senator, I have seen that plan in the files.
Mr. Parrott. I know on several occasions I was told that
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McCone chewed Lansdale out and said, why don’t you get
with it and produce reasonable plans. You're just milling
.• j around and spinning your wheels on this thing.
By the time this thing finally came to a grinding halt
b at the time of the Missile Crisis, everybody, I think, all the
6 members of the group were quite disaffected with both Lansdale
7 land with Harvey.
8 i Senator Baker. How did the President feel about them?
9 :
Mr. Parrott. I don’t know. I really don’t know.
10
Mr. Smothers. Mr. Parrott, even with the entire group
ii !
disaffected with Lansdale and Harvey, wasn't it a fact that
12 ;
at this point Lansdale and Harvey were disaffected with each
i
13 ,
other?
14 j
Mr. Parrott. Yes, that's right.
15 |
Mr. Smothers. And isn't it therefore unlikely that any
16 :
kind of collusion or cooperativeness would produce this
17
amazing amount of unanimity between them as to what happened?
13
Mr. Parrott. I don't suggest that there wa,s any collusion.
19
I can only return to what I said earlier. I think they both mis-
20
interpreted what was said. As I said, I don't recall it so
21
I can only infer this.
22
Mr. Smothers. But the chances of the same kind of
23
misinterpretation, especially with distribution to other persons
24
in the working group, is it a fairly remote kind of possibility?
25
Mr, Parrott, I don't think this is.
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Mr* .'mothers. Moll, Lonsdale's memo went to Hurwitch
: at State, and it went to Harvey, and it went to Harris at
! Defense, and Wilson at the USIA.
Mr. Schwarz. Frank Hand knew about it?
L , Mr. Parrott. Lansdale. As I say, this is the kind of
6 thing Lansdale did. I was looking at Harvey's.
7 i Mr. Smothers. And Harvey is sending it to Helms. This
i
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8 t * is not some secret interpretation . There are at least six
9 -J in, communication of this inf ormation hopefully voiced a, hey,,
j.) j stop, you misinterpreted it. • . . ••
1 1
12
13
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16 !:
17
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19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Wouldn't that be a reasonable interpretation on such
a serious matter?
Mr. Parrott, Well, as I understand it, it was withdrawn
immediately, so I don't know whether the others had a chance.
Who were the others who were recipients?
Mr, Smothers, It was not withdrawn. We had some words
excised, if you will.
Mr. Schwarz. It didn ! t jome back to the Special Group,
though .
Mr. Parrott. No, I don't think so.
Mr. Schwarz. You don't think so?
Mr. Parrott. I don't recall it ever coming back to the
Special Group. No, I can only repeat —
Mr. Smothers. It's a strange coincidence, thoughy. isn't
it'; . this kind of agreement between two folks who were not
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Mr. Parrott. I ion 1 1 think it had anything to do with
whether they were colluding with each other. I don't think
it had anything to do with that.
: Again, ray inf ere ce is that they both independently
•I misinterpreted, and as I said in the case of the Division Chiefs
; this was very easy to do.
b , Senator Baker. Could I ask one question, Mr. Smothers?
I
j I believe Senator Mondale has already put another form of this
i
10 ! question to you, Mr. Parrott, to the effect that you have
11 | no recollection of this at all. But I want to underscore that
12 J you have no recollection one way or the other. You do not
’i
13 j remember it being said, you do not remember it not being said.
14 \ Mr. Parrott. Correct.
i
15 1 Senator Baker. Do you have any independent information
15 ' at all whatever, other than your low opinion of Lansdale and
17 : Harvey that would bear on the credibility of this memorandum?
13 | Mr. Parrott. Well, can I just correct one thing? Let's
gg I not say it's a low opinion. It's a qualified opinion.
20 | Senator Baker. Well, that was my interpretation.
21 J Mr. Parrott. I would say it was a qualified opinion.
22 They both had very good qualities.
23 Senator Baker. Well, that is not the point at issue.
24 Mr. Parrott. That is not the point at issue. I have no
other, you know —
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So no tor Baker. We 11, thank you
Senator Mondale. Well, I think you said dt a little bit
differently. Didn't you say that absent those documents that
you'd seen, in light of the fact that assassination is a very
harsh proposal, based on your own recollect ion , you would have
testified that it did not come up?
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14 :
Mr. Schwarz.
Did i
15 I meeting of the Special Group (Augmented) tell the Special Group
1
15 \ that he was engaged in actual assassination efforts against
17 j Mr. Castro or seek permission to do so?
i
13 . Mr. Parrott. Oh, I don’t think so. I certainly don’t
13 i recall it.
f
20 i Now I don’t thin.c, as a matter of fact, in this particular
|
21 ' meeting I don’t think Harvey probably had anything to say.
22 Mr. Schwarz. You said that Mr. Harvey had stubbed his
23 toe a number of times.
24 Do you recall an incident in the Missile Crisis in which
25 Mr. Harvey acced in a way for which he was subsequently
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criticised by members of the Special Group?
Mr. Parrott • Well, I know this — Harvey was fired,
summarily fired at that time. He was fired for the wrong
reason. I don't know whether this is what you're talking about.
When the Missile Crisis began to get hot, then the word
came down -- well, it really didn't have to come down because
it was perfectly obvsious to everbody, but it did come down
from the President to knock it off, just to stop MONGOOSE
dead in its tracks, just to stop everything because other
things were simply too important to take the risk of having
agents picked up. And there were about, as I recall it, there
were about four or five approved operations in various stages
of development at that time, including infiltration of agents
for intelligence and possible sabotage, etcetera.
In accordance with instructions which were relayed 'by .
Mr. McCone to Mr. Harvey — I don't know what the channels are -
but it was made clear that everything was to be stood, down.
Harvey did stop everything that was underway except the one
operation, and he was totally unable to stop that because they
had been dispatched. This was an agent team of two or three
illegal agents who had been dispatched for Cuba by boat to
land illegally in Cuba and establish themselves there. And
this was at a meeting in the JCS tank, so-called, another
meeting with a lot of people there, much bigger than the
usual group.
TUir ' SUU I II* UNCLASSIFIED
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And it came out Harvey was asked whether he had, in
•i
/accordance with instructions, stopped everything, and he said
| he had except for this one operation and tried to explain that
j there was no possible way to recall these people because there
•i
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j was no communication with them. They were supposed to come
it
: jup on the air with, as I recall it, I think they had radios,
.i
; or perhaps not.
i
1 But in any case, if they did have, they were not supposed
j |
' to come up until they were securely established. So there was
i
: no way to reach these people and there was absolutely nothing
i
j Harvey could do about it. But this got everybody outraged
|
| and the atmosphere at the time, everbody was very, very edgy
i
i
! about the missiles. People levelled their fingers at Harvey
! and said you haven't carried out instructions. And he tried
i
1 his best to explain that it just wasn't possible ta-.carry this
i
! one out ,
| I had great sympathy for him in* this situation. He was
!
i just about summarily fired on the spot for disobeying direct
orders but there wasn't any way he would have obeyed that one.
Mr. Schwarz. You say he was fired for the wrong reason.
What would the right reason have been?
Mr. Parrott. Oh;. I : think - a., succession of ineptitudes.
One of the principal problems, Harvey was a very good,
and maybe he still is a very good, operator. He goes around with
shoulder 1 holsters , etcetera .
TOP' SEQFIET UNCLASSIFIED
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Reference copy, JFK Collection: HSCA (RG 233)
XJUCFD at ‘ ( AT.r fMl ARCHIVE .
bi^LnoJirlED
Maxwell Taylor, who was the Chairman of the Group, was
a very methodical military planner, and much more than that,
i but I mean in that particular field. His concept of, Taylor's
, concept of proceeding with these things was within the general
, framework of policies as established by the MONGOOSE group
I
land checked with the President when appropriate. Within that
framework to have concepts of operations brought in by mostly
'| Harvey -- Lansdale was something of a fifth wheel -- to be
,j approved for further development, to be approved in concept but
' not in detail. In other words, he would come in and say we
j want to sabotage, we want to think about sabotaging a number
! of oil refineries, or something. The group would say yes,
, go ahead, with development^ of plans and bring those plans
i
: back.
j Well, Harvey was unable, he was not a staff guy. He was
| unable to bridge that gap. He never brought them back. And
J then I found he had complained to Helms that Taylor never would
I
! approve anything that he proposed. Helms asked me to come out
i and explain to him how this impasse came about, why was it
i
that Taylor was being so mean to Harvey in not approving anything
And I explained to him that that was not what happened,
that Taylor, as the Chairman of the group with the concurrence
of the group, had approved the concept for further development
of operational plans — exactly what refineries, how many people
are going to go in there, what we're going to use to blow it up,
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j what was the escape plan, etcetera, etcetera, what was the
* deniability, if anything,
i
| That never came back. Helms had net realized that. So
therefore you had an operator but a guy that didn’t seem to
! be able quite to grasp the morass* of . Washington staff work.
,1
j Senator Baker. Did you ever voice these opinions to anyone
■j
. at the time?
i
I Mr. Parrott. I think everybody knew it, Senator Baker.
: Senator Baker. Well, did you ever say this to the Presideni:
10
11
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or anyone else?
Mr. Parrott. I never discussed it with the President at
all, no.
Senator Baker. With anyone else?
14
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Mr. Parrott. Oh, I f m sure. Max Taylor, he was my boss
at the time.
Mr. Schwarz. How about the Attorney General?
Mr. Parrott. No, I had very little communication,
meaningful communication with the Attorney General. Oh, I
can remember after one of these meetings driving back with Mac
Bundy to the White House from a meeting at. .the Pentagon in
McNamara’s office, which Bundy shook his hold in the car and
said, your friend Mr, Harvey does not inspire confidence. I
thought this was rather a succinct comment. They all knew it,
you know.
Mr. Schwarz, Was it your understanding at that meeting with
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Mr, Helms — •
Mr. Parrott. He wasn't totally inept at all, and on;
the operational side very good. But there was a gap there
between that and the other .
Mr, Schwarz. Was it your understanding at that meeting with
Mr. Helms that he understood that Maxwell Taylor was in charge
of MONGOOSE?
Mr. Parrott. Oh, yeah. There was no misunderstanding about.
Max Taylor being in charge of anything he was in charge of.
He was a very tough operator and very conscious of his position,
and I was a great admirer' of — he was the boss. There was no
doubt. Of course he was the Chairman of this group and he
required clearance and he required higher authority approval
on occasions. Of course, everybody knew that.
As a matter of fact, when Taylor set up in the White House
in July of *61 in the wake of the Bay of Pigs, then Allen
Dulles was the DCX. Allen Dulles issued very /strong .■ :
instructions to everybody in CIA that Taylor was in charge and
that anything Taylor asked for was to be given to him and by
extension was to be given to me, that I was his Intelligence !
Assistant.
Mr. Schwarz. What was your understanding of the relations^
between General Taylor and Robert Kennedy?
Mr. Parrott. I think they admired each other in a way
and in other ways there was a certain — I wouldn't say there
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was an antagonism. I think on occasion Bobby Kennedy tried
to put things over that he wanted to do to the group that
Taylor didn’t think was right and Taylor won.
Mr. Schwarz. Now we’ve had testimony first on Mr. Helms —
how often did Mr. Helms come to the meetings of the Special
Group (Augmented) ?
Mr. Parrott. I am unaware that he ever did come.
Mr. Schwarz. And the representatives from the CIA were
'Mr. McCone and Mr. Harvey, generally speaking?
Mr. Parrott. Usually Harvey, not always. Certainly always
McCone or his Deputy. And McCone went on his honeymoon at
one period here and General Carter, who was his Deputy, was
there for a number of meetings. But that was practically
never in my experience during the five or six years that I
did this. I can only think of one or two occasions whether
either the DCI or his Deputy didn’t come.
And as a matter of fact, Taylor was very, very tough on
this. Taylor would not allow, for instance, in the counter-
insurgency group, he would not even allow deputies to come
except in the direst emergencies. He said he wanted the
principals and they damn well better come, and they did come.
Mr. Schwarz. We f ve had testimony from Mr. Helms that
while he did not receive an order to assassinate Fidel Castro,
he was completely satisfied in his own mind that he had
authority to authorize Mr. Harvey to assassinate Mr. Castro,
Tenraw unclassified
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UNCLASSIFIED
and that he had based that judgment upon the general vigor
with which the policy to overthrow Mr, Castro was being pursued,
that there were no limitations as to tactics to be used. That
further, he met frequently, and ' does-: the transcript say
on almost a daily basis —
Senator Baker. r f ve - not • had j an opportunity to find out'. — 1 '
Mr, Schwarz. Frequently with the Attorney General.
Mr. Parrott. Helms did.
Mr. Schwarz . Yes, and \ he . suggested , • but - not the- precise
statement, was made by Mr. Helms that that was the vehicle
pursuant to which he had authority to authorize Mr, Harvey
to assassinate Fidel Castro.
Based upon your understanding of the personalities involved
the Attorney General, Mr. Helms, Mr. Taylor, and anyone else
you think is relevant, what guidance can you give in evaluating
that testimony?
Mr. Parrott. Well, that's a difficult one. I was certainly
not aware that Helms had this feeling that he had the authority
to do this. In fact, I wasn't aware of it until this moment
that he had that feeling ;
I don't know what Bobby Kennedy may have told Dick Helms.
I just don't know. Bobby Kennedy, of course, was a tather
free spirit. He was quite a freewheeler, and he never, to my
recollection, ever expressed this kind of thing in the group,
in the Augmented Group. What he may have done behind the scenes
— UNCLASSIFIED
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I don't know, but if he did do something 6f that sort I think
it would have been in an .egregious undercutting of General
Taylor .
Mr. Schwarz. And that is why he was trying to focus on
the relationship between those two men. Do you think, that
of course is a matter of speculation of opinion, but do you
think that over an extended period of time he would have had
a back channel relationship undercutting General Taylor?
Mr. Parrott. Mr. Schwarz, it's awfully hard to speculate
what Bobby Kennedy would have done. He was quite unpredictable
Now the relations between them were really quite close.
The Chairman. Let me just dd this one factor that may
not have been expressed to you.
Our testimony from Mr. Helms shows two things, and I
would like Senator Baker's close attention. As I recall that
testimony it shows first that Mr. Helms believed that the
policy of the government was to bring down Castro by whatever
means, and he himself was satisfied that this included
assassination. The testimony also shows that Heins was never
told to assassinate Castro, or never instructed to assassinate
Castro by Robert Kennedy.
Now where or why he assumed that assassination was within
the bounds of established policy remains unclear, and I think
this is part of our quandry.
Senator Baker. I might say, Mr. Chairman, I agree with
t an as eu B T unclassified
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that interpretation, and a sort of different emphasis might
he applied to it, but I think that's a fair basis for this
question .
I think one or two other things might be added to it that
are important to this dilemma. For instance, the memo from
Harvey to' Helms saying don't talk about assassination in
writing. If you do I’m not coming to any more meetings. We
don’t do that in open meetings.
The other, the Mafia situation, where according to the
10 \ memo from Helms it says that he has just finished briefing
I
*
11 ,f the Attorney General fully on all of this material. It paints
12 ’• a clear picture that there was a free exchange of information
13 between the Attorney General and Helms. The Chairman is
14 entirely right. We don't know why. We're not able to develop
1 that from Mr. Helms completely. We certainly can't develop
1 •* it otherwise as far as I know, but I think that’s a fair
basis for the question.
Mr. Parrott. Did you say, -Senator, that you don't know
1 > why or what?
/
2 Senator Baker. I don't know what.
;; Mr. Parrott. Quite honestly, I don't think I was aware,
at least, of the extent of this kind of channel. I just, I
» can only say I don't think I was.
24 Senator Baker. Can I go on for a minute? I have here
13 the transcript. Let me read that part of the Helms testimony.
UNCLASSIFIED
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This is the question: "Was it, in your view, the general policy \
2
of the government of the United States, as proposed to be
5
implemented by the CIA, to kill Fidel Castro?" Mr. Helms:
4
"I believe it was the policy at the time to get rid of Castro
!
5
and if killing him was one of the things to be done in this
6 i
connection, that was within what was expected."
7 ;
"And without digging the trench by repetition you felt
8
that the Agency was acting fully within the scope of its
9
i
authority as understood by the Agency?"
10
"Yes, Senator Baker, that is my perception."
11
Mr. Parrott. And you want my comment on this?
12
The Chairman. Yes.
13
Mr. Parrott. I don’t know how to comment on that
14 i
because I don’t know what the content or extent of any back
15 :
channel between Kennedy and Helms was. All I can say is that
16
this was not in the higher level, if you will, group.
17
Senator Baker. I don’t think any of us are trying to
18
press* you into a corner but we are being led into a situation
19
where there is growing evidence that there must have been some
20
other sort of communication but we had no idea what.
21
Now can you give us any assistance at all?
22
Mr. Parrott. I don’t feel your pressing me in a corner
23
at all because I simply don’t know about that. I am not even
24
sure I knew it existed. As I say, Bobby was a freewheeler and
25
I’m not particularly surprised at this, but I don’t believe
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uKtLRSSlFIED
I knew about it at the time. I only saw Bobby Kennedy when
he came to these meetings, which he usually came to late and
left early.
Mr. Schwarz. Senator, could you read the sentence that
has the general policy language in it again?
Senator Baker. It*s on page 137, Volume I of the transcript,
dated June 13th, 1975. It begins on page 12.
"Was it in your view the general policy of the government
of the United States as proposed to be implemented by the CIA
to kill Fidel Castro?"
Mr. Schwarz. Now leaving out any possibility of back
channels and focusing on the general policy as stemming out
of the actions of the Special Group (Augmented) which was,
at least in theory, responsible for the general policy, is it
correct that it was the general policy of the United States
to kill Fidel Castro?
Mr. Parrott. It was not my understanding of the general
policy, no.
Senator Mondale. Now Mr. Parrott, you prepared these
minutes of all of these meetings and you were supposed to
record what the top levels of American government wanted at
that time.
Mr. Parrott. Yes.
Senator Mondale. Now it*s your testimony that your
understanding was different from Mr. Helms*, that you did not
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think it was the policy of our leadership to kill Mr. Castro.
Mr. Parrott. Yes. Certainly not in any forum I participat
in .
Mr. Schwarz. I had just one further document relating
to Trujillo I'd like to call your attention to. It's at Tab G
of Mr. Parrott's book.
Mr. Parrott. I wonder if we could add to my statement.
Senator Mondale, I don't know whether it's right to say that
I didn't think it was the policy. I think that I would have
to say that I was not aware that that was the policy.
Senator Mondale. There were no directives, no notes, no
orders, no talk, no discussion that you ever heard and you
sat in on all of these meetings of the Special Group (Augmented)
as the reporter from which you would have gathered any such
policy?
Mr. Parrott. No.
Mr. Schwarz. And was your understanding that the procedural
policy, that that was meant to require all matters of
significance relating to action against Cuba during the MONGOOSE
period were meant to be proposed, debated upon and decided upon
by the Special Group (Augmented) ?
Mr. Parrott. Yes, of course, short of final Presidential
approval, and I don't doubt that there were discussions with
the President and some*-. or-; all of the principals of the M0NG00S|;
group. But there was never any meeting of the MONGOOSE group
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as such f in 'a other words, including me making it technically -
a MONGOOSE meeting , none with the President, Of course I have
no knowledge of what, well, Max Taylor used to see him a great
deal several times a day and I don't know what they talked about
except what Taylor chose to tell him. And the same with
McCone on'that subject and all the rest of them. State.
Mr. Schwarz. Now would you look at in the Trujillo book
Tab T, and John, let's mark that as Exhibit 6.
(The document referred to
was marked Parrott
Exhibit No 6 for
identification , )
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Mr- Schwarz- Now we* re again tor the * problem; of v; trying . .
to understand your language.' This is a memorandum of the
record of the minutes of the Special Group Meeting, 29 December, .
1960. Mr. Bissell is said to have given the broad outlines
of a two-pronged plan for proceeding with certain actions against
the Trujillo regime and it involved support to a F.igueres group,
was a, group that it Was:- thought, ',might;: take-over- frOm-Mrv,
Trujillo,
And then you quote him as saying at the end of that
paragraph :
"He also emphasized that the proposed actions would not
of themselves bring about the desired result in the near future,
lacking, some decisive stroke against Trujillo himself."
Obviously that thing was authorized in this meeting. It
was just a comment. But to help us understand such language ,
can you read ’‘some decisive stroke against Trujillo himself "
in any way other than a decisive stroke which involves killing
him?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I think it is the same thing as the
others and it's a little ambiguous maybe. This in my view
referred again to a coup or a palace revolution or possibly
some action by dissidents apart from the CIA.
Mr. Schwarz. Well, I think the trouble that one has with
that,.: isn't that the kind of thing that is being talked about
earlier, the limited covert activity, the support to the Figueres
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group? If you 1 re talking about a coup, why don’t you say a~
coup, instead of “decisive struggle against Trujillo himself! 1 ?
Mr, Parrott. I don’t know. Maybe it’s just imprecise
language.
All I can say is to repeat what I said before, that this
was not a deliberate euphemism,
Mr. Schwarz. All right. Now at the next meeting of the
Special Group, which was January 12, 1960, the Special Group
authorized supplies. Now that’s the next document and let’s
mark that as Exhibit 7 .
(The document referred to
E ' 0
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was marked Parrott'
Exhibit No. 7 for
identification . )
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Mr. Schwarz. The Special Group is recorded on the second
page of Exhibit No. 7, which is the January 12, 1961 minutes.
Tab U at the Senators 1 book.
Following this, Mr. Merchant, he was the State Department
representative :
”Mr. Merchant explained the feeling of the Department of
State that limited supplies of small arms and other materiel
should be made available to dissidents inside the Dominican
Republic. Mr. Parrott said that we believe this can be
i
managed securely by CIA, and that the plan would call for
final transportation into the country being provided by the
dissidents themselves. The Group approved the project."
i
\
That doesn't happen to have any provocative language in |
it. But first, you have no doubt that that happened.
The Chairman. Your answer? I
Mr. Parrott. I have no doubt that this was said. I 1
don't remember whether, anything ever got in there or not. i
Mr. Schwarz. What was your understanding of the purpose
of the passage of these arms?
Mr. Parrott. The purpose was to help the dissidents do
whatever they could do because obviously a dissident group
can get nowhere without any arms. And this doesn't mean that
you're giving them sniper rifles to kill Trujillo. It's simply
.a means in any ^classic support. of a resistance group,. it**,
obviously entails giving them arms.
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Senator Mondale. How many guns were supplied?
Mr. Parrott. I don't know.
The Chairman, Three,
Senator Mondale. Three. Would you send three guns to
overthrow a government of the Dominican Republic?
Mr. Schwarz. I think , Senator, we should make a comment
on that so as to no confuse the witness.
What the Special Group said they were authorizing was
a limited supply of small arms and that was interpreted thereafte
ten days after, as meaning 300 guns. Subsequent to that the
three are sent and we get into with the next witness some
problems on how that happened.
Mr. Parrott. Now I am sure they weren't talking about
three guns. This was an army of dissidents and quite obviously
three guns wouldn'.t do.
The Chairman, However, in the end only three guns were
r
sent.
Mr. Schwarz. Six. Two groups of three were passed and
four machine guns were sent but not passed.
The Chairman. Which is hardly the kind of artillery that
would be needed to arm a dissident group.
Mr. Parrott. Well, X really have no knowledge of what
happened between this decision and the actual sending of the
arms. X was not always completely privyy to all of the follow-
ups on this except as progress reports came along to the group,
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which I would make from time to time.
The Chairman. Before we proceed, Fritz, while you. 1 re
here, it's obvious we* re not going to be able to get to Secretary
Rusk this morning. He'll be the first witness this afternoon,
and we will take up at 1:30 instead of 2 j: 0 0 in this room. I
hope we can have a good attendance for that at the afternoon
meeting.
Mr. Schwarz. We have about 15 minutes worth of briefing
on the Trujillo story, as our last exchange illustrated, and
could we start that at 1:15?
Senator Mondale. Well, I was going to request, I have
a conflict at 1:45.
The Chairman. Well, we f ll start at 1:30, and will the
staff please see to it that all Senators are notified of the \
change in schedule and are especially requested to be present. ;
Mr. Schwarz. Now there* s another witness who I think we
can do in ten minutes, and let me describe what he is.
(Pause)
Mr. Schwarz. Curtis, do you have a question?
Mr. Smothers. I do have one question, Mr. Parrott.
Mr. Parrott, I have listened to your testimony. You
seemed to depict the Special Group and Special Group (Augmented,
as being really one that is kind of groping for solutions on
what to do about Cuba, and all of these ideas, some pretty
harebrained, are floating around.
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Am I not hearing you correctly or is your impression
different from those witnesses who have talked about this
being the top priority item for the government about there
being intense pressure on the group to come up with something
that would work with respect to Castro?
Did they have a different sense of the mood than you had?
Mr- Parrott- No, I don't think so, Mr- Smothers- I think
in the first place you have to distinguish between the
Special Group itself and the Special Group (Augmented) •
Mr. Smothers. Yeah, the Special Group (Augmented).
Mr, Parrott. Now what I meant to say was I think the
objective was quite clear to all members of the MONGOOSE
group. I think that the method of reaching — *
Mr- Smothers. Was there intense pressure?
Mr- Parrott- Perhaps there was — well, yes, there was
intense pressure. Indeed there was, because of all kinds of
rumors about missiles and all the rest of it. And as I said
earlier, it had become a completely closed Iron Curtain country,
obviously highly antagonistic to the United States and 90
miles away.
Yes, indeed there was pressure. But what I meant to
convey was it wasn't, it was hard to get down to a clear-cut
method of getting from A to B. I think they knew what B was.
Mr. Smothery. Given this pressure and given the closed
country situation, how do you find that consistent with the idea
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of a palace coup in your interpretation of the words we've
asked about?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I think that's why it's been suggested
through these minutes that capabilities were limited.
Mr. Smothers. Wouldn't it be clear that something certain
and more directed or more controllable than a palace coup
would have- been on the minds of the people who were trying
to accomplish this result?
Mr. Parrott. You mean such as an assassination?
Mr. Smothers. Such as —
Mr. Parrott. Well, I can only go back to my statement
that I at no time recall this having been discussed.
Mr. Smothers. And it's not possible that you could have
not understood the import of the words being exchanged here?
Mr. Parrott. Well, I think if that had happened, I
would have quickly been fired as a secretary of this group.
Mr. Smothers. What about these phrases, this getting
rid of, eliminate, are these your words or are you picking
up the words of the actors there?
Mr. Parrott. Oh, I don't know. After 15 years that's
O i
kind of hard to answer.
Mr. Smothers. Oh, yes, but you must have sorte:;awareness
of what the pattern was. Did you sit down and decide to be
imaginative when you were putting them together, or were you
trying to stay very close to the words of the speakers?
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Mr. Parrott. I think generally X tried to stay pretty
close to the words. Now’ obviously , I again will repeat this
was not intended to be a verbatim transcript. I tried to
summarize what seemed to me to be the important action items,
and I think I would sometimes write down key phrases in my
notes and then dictate these from my own recollection and
i
understanding of what was going on, descibing some of the
things that simply had not floated at all.
Now I think in many cases, yes, I did pick up the exact
language because it seemed to me that that conveyed the flavor
of the meeting as well as anything.
Mr. Smothers. I have nothing further.
Senator Baker. I have a question, if I may.
I am looking at, I assume there is no reason not to refer
to the Inspector General’s report that we have in the files.
Mr. Schwarz. Everybody in the world knows about it.
Senator Baker. I’m looking at the Inspector General’s
report. We have a part of the record, a memorandum bearing
the date 25 April, 1967, Mr. Parrott. It of course is the
opinion, I assume, of the authors of the IG report, but I
wanted to read a portion of it and I’ll ask you if you agree
or disagree with it.
"This reconstruction of Agency involvement in plans to
assassinate Fidel Castro is at best an imperfect history.
Because of the extreme sensitivity of the operations being
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j discussed or attempted, as a matter of principle no official
| records were kept of planning, of approvals or of implementation -
; The few written records that do exist are either largely
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tangential to the main events or were put on paper from
•memory years after.
*! 'William Harvey has retained skeletal notes of his
| activities during the years in question and they are our best
|| source of dates, *. Dr. Edward Gunn of the Office of Medical
Services has a record of whom he met and when, and cryptic
references to the subject discussed. ° ^ TSD
has a record of two or three dates that are -pertinent , arid so
forth."
oft)
, Mr, Parrott. This all has to do with assassination.
Senator Baker. Yes.
! Mr, Parrott. And your question is —
j
I Senator Baker. Do you have any information that would
| confirm or dispute that appraisal, that the efforts, the
| planning and the implementation of efforts to assassinate
i
| Castro were not committed to paper, and because of the extreme
J sensitivity of operations, and it was a matter of principle
. that no official records were kept?
Mr. Parrott. I have no direct knowledge. I assume that
probably is true. All I can say again is the records that
I was responsible for did not include this but not because
they were too sensitive but because it wasn't said.
UNCLASSIFIED
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1
Senator Baker. Let me read from one other paragraph, and
2
I assume your answer will be the same, but ™
5
"It became clear very early in our investigation that
4
the vigor with which schemes were pursued within the Agency
5
to eliminate Castro personally varied with the intensity of
6
the U.S. Governments efforts to overthrow the Castro regime. 1 '
7
Now that relates to the question I believe the Chairman
8
put. Why is the word that we used instead of using the word
9
"coup"? Are we dealing in official records with code words'*
10
with camouflage, for another intent in meaning?
11
Can you give us any information in that respect?
12
Mr. Parrott. Well, I suppose what they are talking about
13
is internal CIA activities that they suggest may have varied
14
with the pressures from the White House and the Special Group
A
15
to do something.
16
Senator Baker. And reading from page 4:
17
"We cannot overemphasize the extent to which responsible
18
Agency officers felt themselves subject to the Kennedy Admini-
19
stration, severe pressures to do something about Castro and
20
his regime."
21
Mr. Parrott. There's no question about that.
22
Senator Baker. That's an interesting sentence, that
23
construction about Castro and his regime.
24
Now did you feel any pressures when you were at CXA to
25
do something about Castro', as contradistinguished from ' *• ,
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UNCLASSIFIED
Castiro l s regime?
Mr. Parrott. I shouldn’t think so. When we talked about !
i
it much earlier it was said that there was in effect a tri- !
umvirate, that it was no good to get rid of Castro himself
because you had Che Guevera and you had Raul. So the three
of them were more or less interchangeable. At least that was
the feeling at the time, and you would have to dispose of all
of them. And I hasten to add by dispose I mean what I said
before, a coup or something.
Senator Baker. And on page 5:
The point is that a frequent resort to synedoche —
the mention, of a part when the whole is to be understood, or
vice versa -- thus we encounter repeated references to phrases
such as "disposing of Castro, 1 * which may be led in the narrow,
literal sense of assassinating him, but it is intended that
it be read in the broader figurative sense of dislodging the
C astro regime.
Reversing the point, we find people speaking vaguely
about doing something about Castro, rwhehl.itsis clear what they
specifically have in mind is killing him. In a situation wherein
those speaking may not have actually meant what they seem to
say or may not have said what they actually meant, they should
not be surprised if their oral shorthand is interpreted
differently than was intended.
Would you agree with that?
UNCLASSIFIED
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I
1 ! Mr. Parrott. Well, it seems to me from the questions this
2 morning that I believe my verbal shorthand was subject to some
5 misinterpretation .
!
■1 ! Senator Baker. Wouldn't it seem to underscore the fine
5 ; dimensions of the dilemma we were discussing this morning?
i
6 i How do you account for the fact that there were efforts- ’made
7 repeatedly to kill Castro by people '.who are not underlings, but wt;
8 ■ were responsible officials of the CIA and still assume that
9 they were not acting beyond the scope of their clearly understood
t
10 | authority?
11 I am not sure that this is a full explanation of that,
12 but doesn 1 t that suggest one possibility that code words
13 had become so prevalent and meaning so fuzzed up that one
14 group think itvone' thing.-an& on'e'^roup think-*' 'it ‘another?
i
i
15 Mr. Parrott. Well, if the code words and the words in
15 the Special Group meetings were interpreted as code words,
17 meaning assassination, then I would say this was a totally
18 | wrong construction.
19 Now I understand your dilemma very clearly. I do not
20 know what the answer is. I find it difficult to believe that
21 | senior officials you refer to would have done this on their
22 j own, or there may. well, .as » you. suggeStad^earlierv have. been
23 I some back channel to which I was not aware.
24 ’ Senator Baker. And that is a possibility that this
i
25 ! Committee will examine. But there is one other point in
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connection with this memorandum that I would ask you now.
On page 4 is a reference to a contingency plan request
by General Taylor an an internal CIA draft in October, 1961.
The sentence preceding is this: '‘Elimination of the dominant
figure iru.a government, "• "Elimination: of a.idbminanti figure/* in
a government even when loyalties are held to him personally
rather than to the government as a body will not necessarily
cause the downfall of the government. This point was stressed
with respect to Castro and Cuba in an internal CIA draft
paper of October 1st, 1961, which was initiated in response
to General Maxwell Taylor's desire for a contingency plan.’’
It is my information from staff that we have not been able to
locate; that document.
Mr. Schwarz. The CIA says they cannot find it. Is the
date October 1?
Senator Baker. October, 1961.
My question is whether or not you know of any such request
by Maxwell Taylor or you know of any CIA document, October,
1961 or any other date responding to a request by Maxwell
Taylor for such a contingency and whether or not the Taylor
contingency plan contemplated the possibility of the assassinati4
of Fidel Castro personally, tb<* assassination of Fidel Castro?
Mr. Parrott. Well, to take them not quite in order, I
had no knowledge of the internal memorandum. I do remember
quite clearly General Taylor asking for really, in effect, a
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UNCLASSIFIED
new plan because this sort of goes to the point that Mr.
Smothers asked before. They were groping for the way to
achieve this objective, and by that time, as I recall, by
October of '61 things had bogged down a little bit and I
recall Taylor calling for a new plan, an overall plan.
Senator Baker. I have here now, I have just been handed
a memorandum dated 5 October, 1961 to the record from you.
Mr, Schwarz. It is Tab P of the book.
Mr. Smothers. Tab F of the Taylor materials.
Mr, Schwarz. lxO, the Parrott materials.
Senator Baker. I'll read the pertinent parts, pertinent
to this line of questions.
"In accordance with General Taylor's instructions I
talked to Assistant Secretary Woodward yesterday about the
requirement for the preparation of a contingency plan."
Was that the same contingency plan that’s apparently
referred to in the CIA memo?
Mr. Parrott. I think it must have been.
Senator Baker. "He told me on the telephone that he
would be heaving for two weeks" -- I assume that means leaving
for two weeks.
Mr. Parrott, Well, there's a copy that has been retyped.
It says "leaving. 1
Senator Baker. "And therefore, his Deputy, Wymberley
Coerr, would have to take this project on.
twii^ii ■ i m UNCLASSIFIED
JUBUBA8BD PER F.L,
If ABA ££
los-eaa <jfk ag*>
DAT*
gsh 82
REPRODUCED at the
national ARCHIVES
UNCLASSIFIED
j "I then met with Mr. Coerr and outlined the requirement to
i
him. I said that what was wanted was a plan against the
contingency that Castro would in some way or another be removed
from the Cuban scene.' 1
That really is poetically liberal language. What does
it mean? What did you mean when you wrote that?
i
(The document referred to
was marked Parrott
Exhibit No. 8 for
identification . )
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reproduced at the national ARCHIVES
UNCLASSIFIED «
Mr. Parrott. Well, I think, as I said in the other
instances, one of the principal objectives was indeed to have
Castro no longer around.
Senator Baker. Does that mean to have him deposed and
exiled, or killed, or any of those things?
Mr. Parrott. I would say it was short of being killed.
Senator Baker. That’s odd in the light of the next
sentence. "I said that my understanding was the terms of
references governing this plan should be quite broad? wa agreed
for example, that the presence and positions of Paul and Che
Guevara must be taken into account.'*
Mr. Schwarz. That is Raul instead of Paul.
Senator Baker. Raul instead of Paul.
Does that mean they should be taken into account if the
regime falls? It*. i seems they would fall ^ with it.
Mr. Parrott. No, I think that goes back to the earlier
point that there ware three that you had to contend with, more
or less interchangeable, and in one way or another getting rid
of one of them or two of them wouldn’t necessarily achieve
your purpose.
Senator Baker. Well, getting rid of, once again — you
say stop short of assassination?
Mr. Parrott. That’s right.
Senator Baker. " I also pointed out to Mr. Coerr and Mr.
Goodwin 1 ' — would that ba Mr. Richard Goodwin?
UNCLASSIFIED
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reproduced at the national archives
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UNCLASSIFIED 84
1
Mr. Parrott. Yes.
2
Senator Baker. — "had been aware of this requirement."
5
Mr. Schwarz. He's coming this afternoon.
4
Senator Baker. "I mentioned to Mr. Woodward the President's
5
interest in this matter."
6
What was the President's interest in this matter, and how
7
did you learn of that interest?
8
Mr. Parrott. Well, I guess I would have learned of his
9
interest through General Taylor.
10
Senator Baker. Did you talk to the President about it?
11
Mr. Parrott. No. I think General Taylor told me — it's
12
in the first line,. "in accordance with his instructions." So
13
what would have happened there is that he would have come back
14
from a meeting with the President and tell me to follow this
15
up.
16
Senator Baker. Well, I wonder though what the full
17
sentence — and I should have read the full sentence to you.
18
"I had mentioned to Mr. Woodward the President's interest in
19
this matter before General Taylor had told me he preferred this
20
not to ba done."
21
Mr. Parrott. Well, that, I think goes to the question,
22
again, of keeping the President out of these things as much as
23
possible.
24
Senator Baker. But the point I'm asking for is this seems
1
25
strange that this is information you came by before Taylor told 1
JUBLKASKD PER
WAR* T-L-
P.L. 108-880 (JFK AC*»
reproduced at the NATIONAL ARCHIVES
^ Jl » xsar zsz "*a» a ■at 3 m S ***'
UNCLASSIFIED " s
1
you ha preferred that this would not be done, if in fact
2
Taylor was the source of your Presidential information.
5
Mr. Parrott. No. What I think I am trying to say^that is
4
Taylor told me to pursue this with Woodward and at some later
5
time he said, don't use the President's name, but I had already
6
gone ahead and used it.
7
Senator Baker. Why was the President particularly inter-
8
ested, if you know, in a contingency plan?
9
Mr. Parrott. Well, this was a matter of continuing
10
concern to everybody, if you got rid of these three guys one way
11
or another short of assassination, what then?
12
Senator Baker. And of course, in the last paragraph, ”1
13
did not tall Barnes of the Presidential interest. However,
14
during the time that I had been trying to reach him, he had
15
seen Goodwin who had told him about this requirement."
16
What- didn't. -you-- tell' him about;, the Presidential interest?
17
Mr. Parrott. In the meantime, ’ Taylor told me not to
18
and it wasn't necessary for Tracy Barnes to know that.
19
Senator Baker. Mr. Chairman, that is all for the moment.
20
The Chairman. Any further questions?
21
Mr. Schwarz. In connection with the same memorandum.
22
we should mark as. part of the record, this one, a memorandum
23
from Mr. McGeorge Bundy to the Secretary of State, National
24
Security Action Memorandum No. 100, dated the same day,
25
Subject: Contingency Planning for Cuba. umai Hf*Ciriri\
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"In confirmation of oral instructions conveyed to
Assistant Secretary of State Woodward, a plan is desired for
the indicated contingency in Cuba.”
The puzzling thing about the memorandum which apparently
didn't go to you, but perhaps you can help on it — is why be
so vagus in the memorandum?
(The document referred
to was marked as Parrott
Exhibit No. 9 for
identification. )
UNCLASSIFIED
JUSJUCA8BD PER P.L.
103-680 (JFK AC*»
DAT
reproduced at the national archives
1
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Mr. Parrott. I don’t know. I can't cast any light on
that.
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The Chairman. On that note#,
and we will come back at 1:30.
(Whereupon, at 12:15 o'clock
recessed . )
we will conclude the hearing.
p.m., the hearing was
UNCLASSIFIED
JUSUCA8BD PER P L
102-623 (JF*
. c/z^r'
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